Libya makes first visit to US in 25 years
By Daniel Dombey and Harvey Morris 
January 4 2008 00:24 
The Financial Times
Original Source: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/b8109668-ba59-11dc-abcb-0000779fd2ac.html
Condoleezza Rice, US secretary of state, on Thursday welcomed her Libyan counterpart to the state department, the first such visit in more than 30 years.
The meeting between Ms Rice and Abdulrahman Muhammad Shalgam, Libya’s foreign minister, is a sign of improved relations between Washington and Tripoli in the wake of Libya’s 2003 decision to renounce weapons of mass destruction.
But it also comes despite protests from human rights organizations and the families of those killed in the 1988 bombing of a US passenger aircraft, for which Libya has admitted responsibility as part of its efforts to end its isolation from the west.
The last time a Libyan foreign minister visited the State Department was in 1972, although Ms Rice and Mr Shalgam have previously met on the margins of the United Nations in New York.
“Secretary Rice urged Libya to move forward in resolving outstanding claims by families of terror victims against the Libyan government and raised human rights as an important agenda item for our bilateral relationship,” said Sean McCormack, State Department spokesman. Ms Rice still intended to visit Libya “at the appropriate time”.
Frank Lautenberg, a Democratic senator who has campaigned for Libya to agree a final compensation settlement, said: “Libya has a responsibility to fulfill its commitments to American victims of its terror and has failed to do so.”
While Tripoli has paid more than $2bn to bereaved families, it continues to contest some claims. That has led Congress to block the dispatch of a US ambassador to Tripoli, disappointing the Libyan government’s hopes of a normalised relationship.
“We welcome improved relations between Libya and the US, but not at the expense of political prisoners, torture victims, and other Libyans who suffer abuse,” said Human Rights Watch, the campaigning organisation that highlighted the cases of three political prisoners it said had “disappeared” in Libya in the past 18 months.
However, the US and countries such as Britain and France set considerable stock in Libya’s greater co-operation with the west, and its bid to open up its energy sector. This month, Libya has assumed the presidency of the UN Security Council for the first time. 
“For a country that was for a decade under Security Council sanctions, it means we are back to normal, at least from the perspective of others. We always considered ourselves in the right,” Giadalla Ettalhi, Libya’s UN ambassador and former foreign minister, said Thursday.